I have been creeping this website for the last 3-4 weeks and finally decided to join since i'm under the impression that there is a wealth of knowledge on here and all in all it seems like good natured fun.

So to cut to the point I acquired a 1989 volvo 240 sedan 5 speed and have intentions of turning it into a production class 2wd rally car. Thought this would be a decent choice seeing that they are used pretty extensively in europe, particularly the f-cup series. There known for being rock solid reliable, and there rwd= big smiles!

Below are a couple of pics of this bucket of magnificence. More to come later.

Well the madness is spreading I see.
OK first thing. The beauty of the Volvo and Xratty is both are plenty of fun with easy, cheap mods...But mods means no Production class..

You haven't told us anything about who you are , what you've done in the past of anything and I never assume people don't have any direct or transferable experience.

HOWEVER! P class is not a good idea...It really is a class for people who cna wrangle a deal from some OEM or importer so that regardless of results overall, there's a chance to make some shameless ads if the car wins it's class, and often with 1 or maybe 2 entrants in the class (traditionally) they get their ad copy..

For the privateer, there's no advantage to the class and lots of drawbacks...
And inevitably every P guy, and the old PGT, statrt stretching the rules and for the longest time every car was a cheater...No it has come to pass that Federartions simply give up because policing all the cheating and dealing with the whiners doing the cheating is such a pain so they've said fukkit, let them do whatever..

Most people that have been around a while say the class ought to be axed..

The whole point is to have as much fun as possible and to test yourself (in rally against the clock and the terrian) and compare how you did to other guys tsting themselves..

So really if you do an event say in 2h10m25s and that is 1st P in a 1 car class OR its 5th in Group 2, it is in the end no difference: its what you did..

The difference is in Group2 (or Group5 ) you can as you get some time in the car and your pocketbook recovers from the initial plundering for cage/seats/harnesses/romper suits/helmet/lights/odo/sumpguard and suspension and all the "Stage Zero" stuff like hoses and bushes, and brakes, THEN you can begin adding the fun bits that makes the nice 2300 RWD cars so nice, like alternate final drive ratio so there some nice fun acceleration, and Gearbox with something with better ratios and stronger when the poor little 5 speed pukes up---which it will do..
And you could whip the head off and mill 1,5-1,6mm to get some bang out of it, again so it pulls

(Everything is fine in lower gears, but from say 85 km/hr up to say 160 acelleration in a stocker in not so hot...and there's mostly 80 to 160+ stuff up there, and some uphills, so we want the car to work best in that range)

Hang on, maybe you haven't seen this old stuff from way back in 1992 or 93.
It's a comaprison tween a stock road car, a VOC (Volvo Original Cup) car with pick and choose of all the best ORIGINAL parts and then a typical early 90s club level car with a nice built motor, right gearset and final drive. Lookat the times particularly the TIME from 100 km to whatever

The title of the article is "Its rewarding to "Sharpen" the Volvo"

It's a wonderfully balanced car, but its kinda large and has a bit of weight.
You want to be in a class where you can, progressively, over time as you get going, warm the thing up.

OK?

So, we know what to do to make the cars go--probaly for less than any other car---what about you?
What have you done prior to getting this disease? Ski? Bikes? cars?

Do you know Kevin Zidkovitch up in the Edmonton area? Seen his 240 he's beavering away on?

Well as far as myself goes I got the disease over a decade ago when my old man took me to spectate what I believe was the rocky mountain rally over a decade ago. Someone gave me a ride back to the hotel in a mildy prepped subie and I was sold. Hell I was more than sold after just watching, that was the icing on top. It's simply taken this long for me to have the means to do this, or at least think I have the means.

As far as any sort of relevant experience I have been riding mountain bikes for as long as I can remember and raced for a couple of years. Not sure how much it transfers over other than the fact that they are both sports that take place on dirt. Also been skiing for similar amount of time but never raced. 4-5+ proper ski hills within 2-3 hours drive of you its hard to say no to that activity!

I have taken part in a couple of tsd's and I have done a half dozen ice racing events at ghost lake (rallycross format not wheel to wheel). Pete Natz who is on here building the group 2 civic (the green machine) has made mention of the ghost lake races I think.

I should mention that all of those previous driving experiences were done in a JDM Wrx so gonna have to learn the tricks with rwd rallying.

Oh Also did a weekend intro to rally school which I personally got lots out of and thought highly of.

As far as actually building this thing I have some basic mig welding skills ( not sure about welding my own cage) access to grinders, wire wheels, various hand tools, etc etc. It also doesn't hurt that my dads a journeyman mechanic for the last 25+ years. Hopefully he will be able to give me a hand with a couple of things.

So... classes to enter. I figured production simply because I wouldn't have to modify the engine and gearbox making things cheaper. The class still allows you to change diff's, suspensions exhaust, brakes, etc. Basically anything driveline with the exception of the gearbox. So I can focus on the suspension and when the time comes upgrade other items and turn it into a open class car. You seem very adamant on saying no to production... could you shed some more light on this?

I probably won't consider group 5 because I've heard/ read that the class is disappearing in a years time. Is this true?

I have read a couple of sources that the gearbox will blowup if you show it anything in the way of upping the power but if I don't do that should it be capable of holding together for at least a while? Rather not fiddle around with putting a t5, type 9 or a getrag 265/262 in for the moment if I can get away with the current box and a rear end ratio change for the time being.

I have no idea who Kevin Zidkovitch is. Have only been involved with the Calgary sports car club since the very end of 2012 so havn't met a ton of people in the alberta area. Does he have a website I can check out?

Congrats and enjoy the journey! I'd say start with a simple set up and get some experience, then really understand and enjoy the mods as you go.

A huge improvement is made by adding a steering quickener, (or change to the XR4ti rack, with a bit of work)

For gearing, find an older rear axle, the 1030 found pre 1982 or so and you can swap in the 4.10 dana 30 r&p from Yukon for $115, weld the diff up good and you are golden. Further down the line, a t5 and 4.88 gears really makes things happen.

The motor can be nicely pepped up by hunting down a K-cam, and shaving the head 50 thou, as John said, but mark my words, before long you will want the turbo.

Quotealkun
Congrats and enjoy the journey! I'd say start with a simple set up and get some experience, then really understand and enjoy the mods as you go.

A huge improvement is made by adding a steering quickener, (or change to the XR4ti rack, with a bit of work)

For gearing, find an older rear axle, the 1030 found pre 1982 or so and you can swap in the 4.10 dana 30 r&p from Yukon for $115, weld the diff up good and you are golden. Further down the line, a t5 and 4.88 gears really makes things happen.

The motor can be nicely pepped up by hunting down a K-cam, and shaving the head 50 thou, as John said, but mark my words, before long you will want the turbo.

I threw down for JVL's suspension and couldn't be happier.

You will get all kinds of advice, but only listen to me...

There are 4.10s already in some axles, mang. If a guys gonna pay for the trouble of buying a gear set, ya know, like splurge and pay a whole hunnerd and sumnpin buck, hell why NOT? get at least a 4.56 at that time?

And bearing the inevitable Jonesing for the magic torque making abilities of turbos---when right-sized---maybe better to get a 4.27 or 4.37

Quotealkun
Congrats and enjoy the journey! I'd say start with a simple set up and get some experience, then really understand and enjoy the mods as you go.

A huge improvement is made by adding a steering quickener, (or change to the XR4ti rack, with a bit of work)

For gearing, find an older rear axle, the 1030 found pre 1982 or so and you can swap in the 4.10 dana 30 r&p from Yukon for $115, weld the diff up good and you are golden. Further down the line, a t5 and 4.88 gears really makes things happen.

The motor can be nicely pepped up by hunting down a K-cam, and shaving the head 50 thou, as John said, but mark my words, before long you will want the turbo.

Interestingly, the 240 with a stock driveline would be eligible for the new 'production 2wd' class under CARS' rules.

The thing a lot of people are having trouble with is that this isn't what P class traditionally has been. None of the nonsensical 'must be the right year of radio delete plate' BS, just a requirement that the driveline be stock but chassis lightening, brake mods and many other modifications are allowed.

As recent as a couple of years ago, in the US, I believe a Production Car was disqualified for having the wrong year of door card. That is the 'Pee class' people have problems with.

In all, P2wd is probably not a bad place to start - and you can work on the modified motor/driveline while you're getting valuable seat time.

Having owned and driven a number of n/a volvos - you'll be able to do fine with your 240 as it is. That gearbox is way more fragile than the 4 speed, but I owned one in my 745 that withstood aggressive driving and clutchless shifting for a solid 100,000 km. (I think the aluminum 5 speeds were essentially the same in the 240 and 740s)

Are you going to be around the Cochrane Rally on the 25th/26th? The event needs volunteers and/or I'm sure some teams might need a hand.

Thanks Morison that is what I was getting at as far as the production 2wd class goes. Yes I will be around for the Cochrane rally... in fact already signed up to help with tech inspection and will be helping in one way or another on the actual race day. Looking forward to it!

Quotealkun
Congrats and enjoy the journey! I'd say start with a simple set up and get some experience, then really understand and enjoy the mods as you go.

A huge improvement is made by adding a steering quickener, (or change to the XR4ti rack, with a bit of work)

For gearing, find an older rear axle, the 1030 found pre 1982 or so and you can swap in the 4.10 dana 30 r&p from Yukon for $115, weld the diff up good and you are golden. Further down the line, a t5 and 4.88 gears really makes things happen.

The motor can be nicely pepped up by hunting down a K-cam, and shaving the head 50 thou, as John said, but mark my words, before long you will want the turbo.

Maybe but PS is a proven approx 1 sec/km advantage way back in the 70s..
Stock Volvo PS ain't bad but it it 55mm rack travel per turn while the Xratty rack is 64mm /turn.. its 2.6 tuns.. The Quaiffe thing which MAY actually be available is 2.5 turns...and you need to find the right manual rack core---a difficult thing..
Since Kevin was able to pick up a right from a Xratty loon just S of Calgary for I think 50 bucks, and the mods involve welding a little D shaped tab onto the crossmember and mating the lower part of the xratty intermediate shaft to the upper part of the Volvo intermediate shaft, seems a LOT easier to do that than search for a manual rack core, but the Quaiffe kit, then find its the wrong core..

Further the manual core, like Saab 99/900 and even Fords manual racks are quite cheese-u-lar with a shitty platic bushing on the pass. side that pounds out in a day or so of fun driving.. Used to be no major prblem when the bush kit was always in stock for $12 but nowadays not even sure if its available. last rack I had to help some poor misguided bastid with I made him a bronze bush for a pack of smokes..

One of the many Turbobrick refugees from the world of broke ass hiposter wannebee virgins living in Mommy's basements, a nice guy name Ryan Fay was brave enough to try the Xratty rack idea --came up in some phone call and we fingered it out and he did it. Super staight forward and woulda been real beautiful if only he bothered to wire brush off some of the decades of grease-n-grime before zotting the D shaped tab on..

This is something to do at some point but not on the tippy top of the list..

Thats sumpin you need to do--with assistance via conversation here and on the phone--you need to write IN PENCIL a "Triage list" and write headings "Absolute Gotta do NOW", then "oughtter do soon as I can (afford or need comes up) and "Be real fun to do so lightly pencil it in and keep my eyes peeled for deals that ay pop up."

I say pencil and WRITE on a paper on a clipboard because we engage a different part of the brain when writing, a more reflective part. I say pencil cause while having a plan is vital, shit happens or "opportunity buys" jump up and we want flexibility and pencil have erasers---and the act of erasing and rewriting ritualises the change.

It's late, I'll continue explaining why you want the freedom of Group2 tomorrow, its about grip as the key to happiness and the interplay between grip and cage design and why doing some mods simultaneously with cage is smrater-er than redoing things later..cut once weld once buy once is better than doing it twice.

Well was at the local junk yard the other day and there was a 940 with a 16 valve head. Pretty sure it has some bent valves (lacking a timing belt and pulleys felt pretty bad) but I would rebuild a junkyard head before using it anyway. Is this something worth grabbing for future considerations or will it be easy enough to find one when/ if the time comes?

QuoteEric Ewert
Well was at the local junk yard the other day and there was a 940 with a 16 valve head. Pretty sure it has some bent valves (lacking a timing belt and pulleys felt pretty bad) but I would rebuild a junkyard head before using it anyway. Is this something worth grabbing for future considerations or will it be easy enough to find one when/ if the time comes?

You can make a 2.3 turbo 8 valve go plenty fast enough that there's no need for the 16 valve head.

So says the guy with the Turbo V-6 in his Volvo....... Hee-hee!

What do you wish for in it? If you wish for a monster that 16 valve head will help you get there. If you need to be naturally aspirated (*yawn!) when starting out then start with the 16 valve head so it won't be such a horrible slug.... Add the turbo later. Build it right!